How to handle a Bat
by dragonprincess1988
Summary: Story time and work don't mix well for some Arrows, but at least Roy knows how to handle a Bat.
1. Chapter 1

Dick gripped the phone tight with frustration. "Roy, are you listening to me? This is kind of important."

Roy held the phone to his ear with his shoulder as he continued what he was doing. "Yeah, yeah, of course I'm listening."

Lian was tugging at her dad's shirt. He had been at the good part. "What does the pretty princess do next, daddy?"

"The princess called her friends over for tea." Roy replied as he tried to pry her fingers off of his shirt.

Lian scrunched up her face as she thought about it. "I don't think the princess likes tea, daddy."

Roy sighed and shook his head. "That's right. The princess just told them she was having tea. They were really coming over for cake, and cookies, and other good stuff."

Lian smiled. "Yeah, that sounds better."

Dick was quickly loosing what was left of his patience. "ROY! When Bats calls you asking questions, and you have no idea what to tell him, don't you dare set him on my ass. Now pay attention!"

Roy held the phone away from his head and waited for Dick to stop screaming. "Could you watch your language? I've got a kid here. And who said I wasn't paying attention?"

Dick was only seething a little…not a lot…and certainly not enough to kill his best friend…or at least that's what he was telling himself. "I'm going to tell you this one last time, okay? After that you are on your own when B calls."

Lian had her arms folded over her chest and was giving her dad one of her worst pouts, and yet he still wasn't paying attention to her. "Daaaaddddy!"

Roy turned towards his daughter and managed to cover up his sigh, but only just. She was giving him THAT face. He wasn't sure how long he would hold out against it. "I'll be with you in one moment, okay pumpkin?" Roy didn't think it was possible, but her pout intensified. He mentally shook his head and focused on Dick. "Okay, you were saying? And why am I playing relay between you two anyway?"

Dick sighed. Any other night, this conversation would have been six lines long. It would have been 'Hi…Hi…This is what's going on…Okay…Bye…Bye'. There wouldn't have been any of these unnecessary questions, and he would have been back to work a long time ago. "We aren't speaking right now, okay? No big deal. Eventually, I won't be so angry, and I'll go tell him he isn't right but it doesn't matter. Then we'll move on and pretend none of it happened." There was silence for a moment and then Dick heard laughter, lots and lots of laughter. "ROY! Are you listening to anything coming out of my mouth?"

Roy stopped what he was doing and sat up straight. "I'm sorry. I'm listening, really. It's just, she was giving me THAT face. I had to tickle her. You can't blame me."

Dick rolled his eyes even though Roy couldn't see it. "Uh huh. Can you focus now?"

Roy turned and faced the wall. "Yeah, okay, I'm with you."

XYZXYZXYZ

Roy's cell phone rang a total of one time before he answered it. He didn't bother looking at the caller ID. "Nightwing left a message with you for me about a case." Bruce was in Bat mode, and wanted this conversation to be short. It was bad enough he had to contact Harper for information, but to have to call Roy because he wasn't talking to Dick was just embarrassing.

Roy was still trying to get Lian to go to bed. He loved her, but there were times when he wished he could just slip her a tranquilizer. "Then the pretty princess found the cute little fluffy kitten hiding in the tree."

"Is that supposed to be funny, Harper? My son would never use such a wordy code." Bruce managed to keep the growl out of his voice, but that was about it.

Roy sighed to himself. It was going to be a long night. Between dealing with Lian and the Bat-clan, he had his work cut out for him. "I was talking to Lian."

"Cute."

The word was clipped, and from the Bat's tone Roy knew he was annoyed. He also knew that the only reason he was getting the full-on Bat was because he wasn't really annoyed with Roy. The bat was angry with Dick, and was just using Roy as an outlet, and it was starting to anger him...a lot. "Don't give me that attitude. It might work with criminals and other Bats, but with Arrows it just pisses us off."

Lian took a sharp intake of breathe. "Oh, daddy said a bad word." She wiggled her index finger at him.

Roy turned his attention to his wide eyed daughter. "Yes, Lian, daddy said a bad word. Don't repeat it." He started to pace the length of the room as he went back to scolding the Bat. "And you, don't you dare try to make me feel bad for spending time with my little girl when you have your son calling me to give you information on a case because you aren't talking to him for whatever reason. You know what; I don't even know what he wanted me to tell you because I was telling my kid a bedtime story. So guess what, buddy? You are going to have to deal with whatever fight you are having and call your son. Good night." Roy ended the call and put his cell phone back into his pocket.

Lian smiled up to her father. "Bad, Mr. Batman."

He walked over to Lian, and gave her a tight squeeze. "Yes, very bad, Mr. Batman. You see, honey, that's how Arrows deal with angry bats. I wouldn't be surprised if you have to do something very similar one day."

She hugged him back, and nodded. "I love you, pissed off Arrow."

Roy looked down at her. "What did daddy say?"

Lian shrugged. "Something about being a pissed off Arrow."

Roy shook his head at his daughter. "Yes, but I also told you not to repeat that, you little imp." He started tickling her. "One more story, and then you go to bed, missy."

Lian stopped laughing suddenly. "Aw, do I have to?"

Roy nodded. "Yes, you have to."

The End


	2. Chapter 2

Dick shut off the TV, got off the couch, and stretched. "Okay, Lian, it's time for bed."

Lian sat on the couch with her legs crossed. "Nah uh."

Dick smiled slightly, and shook his head. "Yes, it's time for bed. You know it is. Now go."

She folded her arms over her chest, and shook her head no. "I'm not tired, so, I'm not going to bed."

Dick rolled his eyes, and tried not to smile. "Cute logic, but you are going to bed. Little girls need their sleep."

She continued to shake her head no. "I'm not little, and I'm not tired, and I'm not going to sleep."

Dick sighed. He couldn't ever remember a time when it was this hard to get Lian to go to bed. In fact, when he had watched her two weeks ago, it wasn't nearly as difficult. "It's been a really long day, and even if you don't need sleep Uncle Dick does, and I can't go to sleep until you are in bed."

Lian held her head to the side and thought about that for a moment. "Well, you could sleep, and I could watch over you." She smiled brightly at her solution.

This time Dick did smile a little. "Ha ha…no, not going to happen."

Lian looked up at Dick and gave him her best pout. "Why not?"

"Lian, go to bed." He hadn't meant to use the Nightwing voice--especially not now and not with her, but he was really tired, and things tended to slip when he got this exhausted.

Lian got off the couch, and pointed her index finger at him. "Daddy said that's your bat voice, and you aren't supposed to use your bat voice when you aren't in the pretty black and blue costume. He also said that Arrows," she pointed to herself, "like me, are supposed to handle bats, and we aren't supposed to fall for _the voice_ or _the glare_."

Dick suddenly realized why Lian was being so difficult, and he really wanted to hurt Roy now. "Oh, he did, did he?"

Lian nodded her head vigorously. "Yupp, Timmy said that he doesn't even bother trying anymore, because Arrows are good at getting Bats to behave. Timmy also said that I'm especially good at it."

Dick began to rub his temples. Was everyone he knew involved in this? It was bad enough that Roy had been so vocal about it. Did Timmy really have to join in on the fun? "Oh, really?"

Lian smiled and nodded again. "Yeah, and daddy said I'm supposed to hit bad Mr. Batman with a rolled up newspaper if he tries to scare me into being good, because scaring kids is just wrong."

Dick smirked as he saw the doorknob turning behind Lian's head. "Your daddy said all of that, did he?"

She crossed her arms over her chest, and nodded once again. Roy walked in, and saw the standoff taking place between his daughter and his best friend. "What did I miss?"

Dick laughed. "What did you miss? It seems that _I_ have missed quite a lot--and Lian was just informing me about a few things."

Roy just stared at him blankly. "Oh?"

Dick folded his arms over his chest and raised an eyebrow. "Yeah. The only thing I can't seem to think of is when you got so bold when it came to dealing with us Bats. Hitting Batman with a rolled up newspaper?"

Roy rubbed the back of his head and started to laugh that oh-so-special laugh that said 'I'm in trouble, aren't I?' "Lian, why don't you go get ready for bed?"

Lian smiled, and shrugged. "Okay, daddy." She skipped away in the direction of her room after giving them both a hug.

Roy knew he was in trouble now. "So…uh…was she good while I was gone?"

Dick smirked. "Cute distraction…not going to work, but cute all the same."

Roy held up his hands defensively. "I just want to state that you have known my position on the Bat ever since we first met, and none of this should come as a surprise in the slightest."

Dick punched him in the arm as hard as he could. "Yeah, I just didn't think you would go all Arrows against Bats with your daughter. I mean putting her on the front lines isn't very nice."

Roy rubbed his arm, and stared at Dick with a raised eyebrow. "What's so bad about it? It's not like she talked to the Bat. Plus, I think she might have actually hit him with the rolled up newspaper had she gotten the chance--in which case, Tim is under strict orders to send me video footage of such."

Dick shook his head. "How in the world did you get Timmy involved, anyway?"

Roy smiled as he thought about it. "It was simple really. I just told him that I would help when he came up with another 'remove Damian from the Bat-family plot'."

Dick laughed. "Okay, well, I don't know if you know how to handle _all_ bats, but you certainly know how to handle Tim, or at least get him to work with you. Either way, if Tim's putting his evil little mind to something other than pranking me, I'm all for it."

Roy nodded in agreement. "Well, I figured I had to do something to get him off your case after last month. Trust me, pink hair really _isn't_ your thing."

Dick glared at him. "I thought we weren't going to mention that ever again."

"Yeah, yeah, turn down the bat glare, will you? Technically, I did you a favor. If it wasn't for me," Roy pointed at himself in much the same way as Lian had earlier, "Timmy would still be tie-dyeing your socks and gluing them to your feet, filling your boots with tiny toys, and super gluing your masks to your ceiling. True, all of that evil has been turned onto the Bat, but it's worth it…no?"

Dick sighed. He was tired and this conversation needed to end about ten minutes ago. "Yeah…okay…you're right. Now, don't you have a kid to put to bed?"

Roy shrugged. "Um, isn't that the babysitters job? What am I paying you for?"

Dick looked at him, completely devoid of emotion. "You aren't paying me."

Roy rubbed the back of his head, and then started to walk off in the direction of Lian's room. "Right, see you tomorrow."

Dick hung his head. "Yeah, tomorrow…" His voice trailed off as he went for the door. Could he really do this all over again tomorrow?

The End


End file.
